


apologies

by anotheridiotgenius



Category: ATEEZ (Band)
Genre: Angst, Asexual Character, Fluff, Gen, Gen Work, One-Sided Attraction, Rejection
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-01
Updated: 2021-02-02
Packaged: 2021-03-12 01:00:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,469
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29126868
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anotheridiotgenius/pseuds/anotheridiotgenius
Summary: "Why are you so mad at me apologizing to you?" Hongjoong replied, confused by Seonghwa's anger."You always apologize for mistakes you don't make!"
Comments: 2
Kudos: 20





	1. lashing out

**Author's Note:**

> *smashes foot to door and awkwardly hops into the room* welcome to my hell hole
> 
> tis i, the stonorca aka that one stoner orca from super mario galaxy, here to give feels and shit
> 
> uh this is my first fic in like 2 or 3 years based on what happened between me and my supervisor, so this took me a while to write without my brain cringing at everything I wrote
> 
> also my gifted kid burnout really kicked in writing this so any validation works please my parents didn't acknowledge me for most of my childhood 👉👉
> 
> alright imma dip and stop stalling

A tear fell from his face onto the dusty table. He sniffled and choked on his tears. His muffled cries could be barely heard from outside the break room, with the door slightly open in order not to lock himself in. He kept his head down on the table, covered by his arms, sobbing quietly onto the floor. He couldn't help but cry, his thoughts and regrets drowning his mind. The flashbacks of his superiors scolding him and his coworkers continued the flood of tears.

_"I've never been more upset at the work you did tonight."_

_"You've worked here the longest, I thought you knew better."_

_"If you do this again, I'm gonna have to write you up."_

_"I don't know what made you think that this is okay!"_

_"I'm disappointed in you."_

He could hear the door open slowly, but ignored it, trying to hold his tears back. Someone sat in a chair in front of him, a small sigh passed their lips. He looked up to see Hongjoong, his supervisor, twiddling his fingers on the table, looking worried.

"Are you okay, Mars?"

He wasn't okay. The sight of the person he disappointed tonight made him want to cry even more. He bit his lip to hold back his tears, nodding once before looking down. His eyes were red and puffy, he was sniffling a bit and he clutched the edge of the table in fear and guilt.

Hongjoong sighed. "Look, I'm sorry about what happened tonight. Honestly, this was meant to intimidate Wooyoung in order to get his head out of his ass and give a shit about doing the work properly here. Also, it's been an overall frustrating day for me, so I'm not only mad at this." He scratched the back of his neck. "I'm sorry for yelling at you, Seonghwa."

"Why are you sorry?" Seonghwa mumbled. "I was the one that should've been stricter with Wooyoung. I know that he likes to joke around, so I shouldn't have trusted him to clean by himself."

"I understand, but you two haven't been the only people to do a half-ass job cleaning theatres," Hongjoong replied. "I think tonight was the night that I was fed up enough to say something. However, I shouldn't have made you the target of criticism tonight like the managers did. I think everyone knows that this was mainly Wooyoung's fault."

The thought of him not doing well enough to let Hongjoong down again upset Seonghwa even more. Another tear slipped down his face and fell onto his shirt, causing Seonghwa to wipe his face in order to not seem so devastated. He looked up at Hongjoong, who seemed remorseful, but it made him frustrated to hear undeserved, pitiful apologies from Hongjoong.

"Why are you apologizing for this?" he asked, a slight tone of annoyance in his voice.

Hongjoong was surprised by Seonghwa's question. "I-I just feel bad for getting mad at you guys, I didn't mean for-"

"Why are you apologizing for something I did wrong?" Seonghwa asked again, raising his voice a bit, clearly pissed by Hongjoong's apologies.

"Why are you so mad at me apologizing to you?" Hongjoong replied, confused by Seonghwa's anger.

"You always apologize for mistakes you don't make!" Seonghwa argued.

"Am I not allowed to feel bad for people?" Hongjoong argued back.

"Do you know how guilty and humiliated I felt being reprimanded by managers when all I want to do is please them with good work?"

"I'm sorry that you got scolded!"

Seonghwa slammed his hand on the table. "There it is again!" he said, getting up from his seat.

Clearly angered at this point, Hongjoong stood up and faced Seonghwa eye-to-eye. "I don't know what the hell has made you so mad, but I'm trying to comfort you. I don't apologize for things I can't control."

"Then why the hell did you apologize for your sexuality?"

Hongjoong froze. Seonghwa's question made him stop talking.

"Why did you apologize to me for being an ace?" Seonghwa repeated, his eyes tearing up even more.

"When did I apologize to you for that?" Hongjoong asked.

"When I confessed my feelings for you!" Seonghwa cried, his face soaked with tears.

"What the hell do you mean by that?"

"I don't give a fuck that you don't like me back, that's fine. I've been rejected many times, I'm kinda used to it at this point. But you constantly apologized to me for being asexual that now I feel bad. Yeah, I should have realized that you were an ace before confessing to you. But the fact that you felt like you were in the wrong made me feel even worse about our friendship."

Seonghwa's outburst left Hongjoong speechless, which made Seonghwa realize his words. He just attacked his superior and friend for something they can't control just because he was heartbroken. Trying to return their relationship to normal made him selfish. He knew he couldn't have Hongjoong but he didn't want to lose him as friend. All he could think of was how hurt Hongjoong must be, and the guilt crashed over him like a burning building.

"That's all I wanted to say." He turned away from Hongjoong out of shame, making his way towards the door.

"Wait, can I walk you to your car?" Hongjoong offered in an apologetic tone.

Seonghwa stopped as he was about to leave, but he didn't look back at Hongjoong. "I'm fine," he stated in a shaky voice. A tear dropped from his eye once more before he left Hongjoong alone in the break room.

"Goodnight, Hongjoong," he said before closing the door behind him.


	2. reconcile

Seonghwa swiftly walked to his car, keeping his head down so no one could see his red, puffy eyes. Tired and upset, he didn't hear the "goodnights" from his other managers as he felt too ashamed to even look at them. He made it to his car, and he climbed into the backseat, locked the doors and continued to sob. The tears couldn't stop falling from his cheeks onto the leather seats. He pulled his legs into his chest and curled into a ball of sadness.

After about fifteen minutes of crying, Seonghwa sat up and pulled himself together. It was almost midnight. He was extremely tired, almost falling asleep in the backseat while crying. He crawled into the driver's seat and started the car. He turned the radio off and drove in silence.

Once he made it home, he immediately went to his room and threw himself onto the bed, letting out a pained moan for the horrible day he had. His phone vibrated and Seonghwa reluctantly checked it to see Hongjoong texted him.

**_Joongie: Shortly after you left, the computer upstairs decided to crap out and stop all the movies 🙃. It's just been one of those days. Good night_ **

Seonghwa let out a soft, sad chuckle before drowsiness filled him and finally shut his eyes.

~~~~~

Over the next few weeks, Seonghwa wasn't assigned shifts with Hongjoong as his shifts would happen before or after his supervisor's. What would happen was Seonghwa would see Hongjoong for a second before Hongjoong would step away into the manager's office, so Seonghwa couldn't talk to him. Even though Seonghwa desperately wanted to talk to Hongjoong about that night, he was scared to do so, fearing it might hurt their relationship even more.

However, a few weeks later, Seonghwa was lying on the couch, scrolling through his phone, when he received a call from Hongjoong. Surprised by the sudden call, he answered it with hesitation.

"Hello?"

"Hey, Seonghwa. You were supposed to work the closing shift tonight, remember?"

Seonghwa froze, immediately filled with fear and confusion. "No, I-I'm supposed to work tomorrow." He pulled up the gallery on his phone and found the picture of the schedule. "Yeah, I'm supposed to work tomorrow."

"That's strange. It says on the schedule that you work tonight."

Seonghwa became even more confused. Did he switch shifts with someone and forgot about it? No, he hasn't switched shifts with anyone in the past two weeks. Did they need him to work tonight? They would have told him in advance though. Seonghwa stared at the schedule, trying to figure out what was happening.

Then, he noticed it.

He was looking at last week's schedule.

_fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck_

Seonghwa hung up the call and ran to his room, putting on his uniform as fast as he could while trying not to panic. He felt his eyes well up with tears, the pain and guilt building up inside him. He was about to grab his keys and run out the door when his mom saw him. "Mars, are you alright?" she asked. "Why do you have your uniform on?"

"I-I thought I wa-wasn't supposed to work tonight but-" Seonghwa sniffled, trying not to collapse into tears. "But I had the wrong sch-schedule!" he sputtered through teary eyes and a clenched throat.

His mom sighed and pulled him into a hug. "It's okay," she cooed while rubbing Seonghwa's back. "You're a good employee. This is the first time you'll be late out of the two years you've worked there." She pulled away from the hug and smiled, making Seonghwa feel a bit better.

After that, Seonghwa ran to his car and drove as fast as he could (legally). On the way, his mother's reassurance disappeared as his mind swirled with worrying thoughts and terrible outcomes, which included getting fired. The thought of being fired terrified Seonghwa, and he felt his throat tighten up again, making it hard to breathe. His mind was so clogged with self-hatred and guilt that he almost crashed into another driver, causing him to have a mental breakdown for the rest of his drive to the theatre.

Once he arrived, he quickly walked inside, keeping his head down so no one would see his teary-eyed and puffy-red face. He sped to the break room, immediately taking a picture of the new schedule. Then, he quickly clocked in, grabbing a broom and bucket, and walked out the the lobby, trying to avoid looking at other people, but his two of his coworkers, Yunho and Yeosang, immediately hugged him and repeated that everything was alright and business had been slow, so they hadn't been doing a lot. Even his manager reassured him that no one was mad or disappointed. Seonghwa tried to accept the reassurance, but the guilt still overcame him, making him feel worse when he was being comforted.

At that moment, Seonghwa noticed a few people walking out of a theatre, smiling and talking amongst each other. Seonghwa looked down at the movie schedule for the night, making sure it was ready to be cleaned. He slowly snuck off to clean the theatre by himself because he wanted to do more work tonight to make up for his tardiness.

The theatre was quiet. The movie had already ended, making Seonghwa wonder how long it's been since the credits finished. Luckily, since only a few people showed up for the movie, he worked as fast as he could so nobody would start to question his whereabouts. He cleaned rapidly, sweeping up popcorn as fast as he could and using all his strength to shove armrests back up into their original positions. It didn't take him long to finish the last row when he heard a familiar voice.

"May I just say?"

Seonghwa stopped. "What are you doing here?"

"Well, that wasn't the response I was expecting," Hongjoong chuckled, already jogging up the stairs of the theatre. The phrase became a special line between Hongjoong and Seonghwa to greet each other or figure out which theatre they were in. It all started when Hongjoong mimicked Seonghwa whenever Seonghwa was in a passionate mood, always starting his rants with "may I just say". That phrase became so funny to the both of them, it became their inside joke.

Seonghwa looked down towards his feet and continued to sweep. "Why are you here?" he asked begrudgingly.

"I came to check on you to see if you were okay," Hongjoong replied, his tone turned serious and worried. "I know you, Mars. You haven't smiled all day, you're avoiding eye contact with everyone, you haven't spoken a single word ever since you walked in, you even snuck off to clean this theatre by yourself- actually, you usually clean theatres by yourself." He waved his hands in a "never-mind-I-digress" manner. "Look, you're not in trouble! This is the first time you've been late! Don't beat yourself up for it!"

Seonghwa wanted to beat himself up for it though. His eyes filled with tears as he stood before his supervisor in the same situation as that night, him being mad at himself and Hongjoong trying to comfort him. The pain really hit him hard.

"I'm sorry for all this."

"It's okay! We've all been late before, it's ju-"

"No! I'm sorry for yelling at you before!" Seonghwa choked out, the tears finally running down his face. "I'm sorry for saying you apologize too much and not considering your feelings. I was mad at myself that night but took that anger out on you. All you were trying to do was comfort me, but I lashed out at you, even confessing my feelings for you when that wasn't an appropriate time to do so, and-and-" Seonghwa tried to spit out more words, but his throat made him feel like he was drowning, causing him to blubber nonsense and sob furiously. He dropped to his knees and covered his face in his hands, feeling undeserving of forgiveness.

Hongjoong slowly bent down onto his knees to face Seonghwa. Gently grabbing Seonghwa's hands and removing them from his puffy-eyed face, he pulled Seonghwa into a hug, holding him tight as Seonghwa cried. "Shh," he whispered warmly, "it's okay, Mars. I'm not mad at you. And, even though I don't have feelings for you, I still want us to be friends." He pulled away from the hug to look at Seonghwa face-to-face. "Is that alright?"

Seonghwa sniffled a bit and wiped his eyes with his hand. "Will you still dance with me to the Veggie Tales theme song?"

"Yes, that shit slaps."

Seonghwa let out a small laugh. "Then of course I will."


End file.
